Gruber on HomePod

I’ve been testing Apple’s new HomePod for the last week or so, and this is the first product review I’ve written that could be accurately summarized in the length of a tweet, and an old-school 140-character tweet at that: HomePod does exactly what Apple says it does, doesn’t do anything more than what Apple says it does, and costs $349. There.

Click through to read the full review.

Gruber’s impressions line up with most of the other reviews. For primary objectives Apple appears to have nailed it.

An amazing small speaker - Done

Siri as primary interaction model for HomePod - Done

Amazing wireless interface for said speaker - mostly done

Some notes: for now HomePod only supports AirPlay 1. It’s successor, AirPlay 2 is coming in a software update. This will enable multi-room audio and less latency.

Siri’s functionality is limited for now, but HomePod is billed primarily as a speaker, not an assistant. I would expect more Siri functions with future software updates.